The Patriot Act
The patriot act was established in 2001 to help the United States law enforcement detect and prevent Terrorism. The bill was developed after the 9/11 act after congress realized that it needed to deal with Terrorism on its home soil. Before the 9/11 attack, congress mainly concentrated on developing legislation to stop international Terrorism. The most important part of the patriot act is that it allows law enforcement to use measures that they could not have used before to counter-terrorism attack. The act enabled law enforcers to use surveillance and wiretapping to investigate terror, improve intelligence and information sharing between agencies, and to make it hard for people involved in Terrorism to enter the US. It is essential as it helps law enforcement to identify and prevent terror attacks. The act has been successful as the FBI has been able to stop a lot of terror activities with the assistance of the patriot act.
The passing of the patriot act affected some civil liberties and the rule of law. Despite the importance of the bill to protecting its citizens, it has been criticized as it allows government agencies to spy on American citizens without due process violating their constitutional right of privacy. The act increased the risk of innocent citizens being accused of a crime they did not commit and also searching of homes without the permission of the owner. Some parts of the act violate the rule of law with the court finding section 215 of the patriot act not legible for validating a bulk collection of phone records of American citizens (Sanders 37). The term USA PATRIOT in the law stands for Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism. It could be a concern as the rules are stricter for non-citizens of the United States living in the country for work reasons. The act is seen as a move by the government to remove non-citizens from the nation.
Work Cited
Sanders, Michael. “The USA PATRIOT Act and punctuated equilibrium.” (2016).